(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for using an image support regeneratively, wherein an image is repeatedly formed thereon, wherein the method comprises the steps of wetting the image support having the image formed thereon through at least one liquid selected from the group consisting of water, a solution of a surfactant, a solution of a water soluble polymer, and a solution of the surfactant and the water soluble polymer, and while heating a material forming the image, adhering the material to a flaking member having a greater adherent force to the material than the adherent force between the material and a surface of the image support so as to flake and remove the material from the surface of the image support. The present invention is also concerned with a tool for forming the image on the image support.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
Various methods for using the image support repeatedly and devices used in the method are known in the art in which a material, such as toner, for forming the image is removed from the image support, such as paper, for retaining the image formed thereon. For example, a method for removing the toner by using a solvent is known from a Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 1-101576, in which a paper being fixed with the toner is dipped into the solvent for toner resin and applied with a ultrasonic vibration so as to free the toner dissolved in the solvent from a surface of the paper. Furthermore, a method for removing the toner from the paper is known from a Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 4-300395, in which the solvent is adhered to a printed portion of the used paper by means of a dip, a spray or an application, and the dissolved toner is removed by means of a washing, an air aspiration, an absorbent attachment, a mechanical flake or an electrostatic aspiration.
A method for removing the toner without using the solvent is known, for example, from a Japanese laid-Open Patent Application No. 2-255195, in which a thermally fusible toner is attached to a printing material by an electrophotographic copying or a thermal transfer, wherein the printing material is formed of the image support applied with a parting agent. Then the printing material covered with a flaky material for the toner is passed between a heating roller and a pressing roller, and the flaky material is flaked after the flaky material has been cooled down so as to remove the toner attached to the flaky material from the printing material.
An eraser for removing the toner without using the solvent is known from a Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 4-64472, in which the eraser comprises an endless sheet having a surface covered with fusible resin, heating and cooling rollers for supporting and advancing the endless sheet, a pressing roller for pressing paper, such as erasable paper having a surface being processed to be parted, against softened or fused thermally fusible resin, and a drive unit for driving these rollers together. Furthermore, a toner eraser is known from a Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 4-82983, in which two rollers being arranged in parallel for pressing on each other and rotating so as to pass a paper through a pressed portion between the rollers, a heating unit for heating at least one of the rollers, a scratching unit for releasing the paper passing through the pressed portion from the rollers, and a flaking unit for removing the toner being adhered to the rollers from these rollers.
However, the above-described method and erasers for removing the toner without using the solvent as described above have the following disadvantages when the toner is removed from an image support formed from a normal paper on which an image has been printed wherein the normal paper has a surface on which paper fiber exists. For example, at a fixation process in the electrophotography, the toner is strongly fixed to the fiber on the surface of the image support by fusing wherein the toner contains mainly thermal fusible resin. Therefore, the paper fiber is scratched from the surface of the image support and a quality of the paper is degraded when the toner is removed from the image support. Particularly, when the flaky material, the endless sheet or the image support around the rollers is heated or pressed, a problem occurs that it may be difficult to remove the toner from the image support since the fixation between the toner and the image support can be increased.
We have described a method for flaking a toner from an image support, for example, in a Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 4-255916, in which the printed image contains at least one liquid (hereinafter referred to as a treatment liquid) which is selected from the group consisting of water used for an instabilization agent, a solution of a surfactant, a solution of a water soluble polymer and a solution of the surfactant and the water soluble polymer, and a flaky member is inserted between the toner and the image support, so that the toner is adhered to the flaky member by heating or pressing and is removed from the image support with the flaky member. According to the above-mentioned method, the toner can be solely removed from the image support while preventing a paper quality of the image support from being degraded and thus the image support can be used repeatedly.
However, when an image is shaped on the image support by being touched up with a common pen such as a ballpoint pen, a pencil, an automatic pencil or a felt-tip marker, removal of the shaped image from the image support by means of the above-mentioned method for removing the toner from the image support is difficult. Therefore a problem occurs that the image support cannot be used repeatedly for forming the image thereon.